Mount Desert OKs $2 million marina upgrade

MOUNT DESERT, Maine — Voters decided to keep two of their incumbent selectmen and to approve a $2 million marina renovation project in Northeast Harbor at the annual town meeting this week.

Selectman James “Rick” Mooers received 251 votes and Tom Richardson, chairman of the Board of Selectmen, received 280 votes in Mount Desert’s municipal elections on May 3. Challenger Sumner Rulon-Miller fell short in his bid to be elected to the board, garnering only 180 votes. The results have been posted on the town’s official website.

Voters also decided, with a 220-184 vote, to allow the town to borrow up to $2.2 million to renovate the shoreside marina facilities in the village of Northeast Harbor.

The project is expected to result in new parking and traffic patterns at the marina, a new harbor master’s office, new bathrooms and other improvements.

According to Durlin Lunt, Mount Desert’s interim town manager, the bond is not expected to affect the debt level for the town, which plans to retire some debt as it takes on the marina project. He said the town typically makes about a half-million dollars a year in marina-related revenue, and it hopes to use as much of this reve-nue as possible to repay the bond.

At the open session of Mount Desert’s annual town meeting on Tuesday night, residents approved budgets of $7 million in noneducational expenses, $2.9 million for the elementary school and nearly $745,000 for the town’s tax payment to Hancock County. Combined with the town’s $2.3 million share of the Mount Desert Is-land High School budget, which already had been determined at a separate school district meeting, Mount Desert should have an overall 2010-2011 municipal budget of slightly more than $13 million.

The amount of money the town expects to raise in property taxes for the 2010-2011 fiscal year is roughly $11,637,000, which is $34,000 more than the $11,603,000 the town raised in property taxes in 2009-2010. But according to Lunt, the town’s tax rate of $5.85 for each $1,000 of a property’s assessed value is expected to de-crease slightly, if anything.